Critics of Christianity, and often Christians themselves, wonder why at times it seems that God is hidden from us. God never makes himself so obvious it is impossible for us to doubt. Why doesn’t he, they always and we sometimes ask, make himself more obvious? That’s a fair question, and not only one we modern people enveloped in a secular culture ask. As an answer, I’ve discovered reading the Bible from cover to cover, and also writing my way through my reading, that God rarely makes himself so obvious that it can’t be explained in some other way. There are few times in redemptive history that Yahweh, Israel’s God, makes himself so obvious that it would seem impossible for the people to question his existence, but that never determines their trust in and obedience to him.
I love that the Bible is this way because it’s not terribly different than our own lived experience, as it has been all throughout the history of the Church for his people. If what we read in the Bible was completely different than our partially hidden encounter with God, then I would have a tough time believing it was true. As it is, the Bible reads real. The examples are endless, but something that stands out to me is the passage of time; God is never in a hurry. Doesn’t it seem that way in our lives? His timeline and ours rarely intersect. In the Bible that’s magnified a zillion times.
A great example comes almost from the beginning. In Genesis 15 as the Lord is establishing his covenant with Abram in some bizarre ancient ritual, he tells him that “for four hundred years your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own and that they will be enslaved and mistreated there.” Come again? Did you say 400 years? Think about it, 400 years ago was 1618! In 1620 the Mayflower Compact was signed, and Plymouth Colony founded in Massachusetts. That’s a long time ago! What a strange way for God to start encouraging his chosen vessel through which to bless all the peoples of the earth. Not to mention that Abram’s descendants will be in slavery those 400 years. Wow, thanks God. Can’t wait!
You notice reading through Scripture God never makes it easy for his people to trust him, and things taking a very long time is part of that. You would think if these were all made up stories (as skeptics claim to know with absolute certainty), God would be a bit more obvious to his people and easier to follow, but he’s not. Speaking of Abram, how about his life. God picks a 75 year-old man out of all the men in the ancient near east to make into a great nation through his offspring. You’d think he might pick someone a tad younger? But no, he picks an old man and a barren wife, then tells him to up and leave everything to go to some strange land he’ll inherit that’s supposed to be really great, but is has all kinds of different peoples living in it. Ten years and no children later (Abram 85, Sarai 10 years younger), how might you feel? Maybe God changed his mind? Maybe it wasn’t really God after all? Maybe you just imagine God spoke to you? After numerous old people sexual encounters (which is a lot of work!), and still barren, Sarai might have been telling Abram exactly this.
Finally Sarai and Abram take things into their own hands because waiting for God to do something just isn’t working. Abram has a child, Ishmael, through an Egyptian maidservant of Sarai. Bad idea, but understandable. Then the story skips 13(!) years when Abram is 99. So it’s been 24(!) years since God’s promise, and nothing, zip, zero, nada. That’s a lot of fruitless sex! But at 99 the Lord shows up again, obviously in no hurry. He confirms his covenant promise to the renamed Abraham (to show that time literally is nothing to him, God changes his name from exalted father to father of many), and you have to love Abraham’s response: “he laughed and said to himself, ‘Will a son be born to a man a hundred years old? Will Sarah bear a child at the age of ninety?'” Notice he didn’t quite have the guts to say it to God’s face, if you will. God ignores the question. And since God has a sense of humor he says the child’s name will be “he laughs,” or Isaac. Then the Lord appears to Abraham and this time Sarah as well, and she also laughs at the announcement of the child to come, but denies it. It’s like God wants them to remember every time they see their promised child that they thought he couldn’t pull it off. He does!
As I tell my children all the time, the Bible has verisimilitude in spades, that is, it has the the appearance of being true or real. The so called hiddeness of God is part of that, and is the way he’s always related to his people. Next time you read the Bible you’ll notice it everywhere. You’ll also notice the times where God does make himself obvious, or when Jesus in the gospels does miracles to prove who he is, it doesn’t make any difference. Whether someone trusts in God, like Abram did and it was credited to him as righteousness, is not an intellectual issue, but a moral one. It is not an evidentiary issue, of which there is plenty, but an issue of God turning a heart of stone to a heart of flesh. And building in his people the trust muscle, if you will.
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